LouisianaVoice holding first ever ‘Boob of the Year’ contest

As we face the end of eight years of ineptitude, deceit, and whoopee cushion governance, LouisianaVoice is proud to announce our first ever election of John Martin Hays Memorial Boob of the Year.

There are no prizes, just a poll of our readership as to whom the honor should go in our debut survey.

Hays was publisher of a weekly publication called appropriately enough, the Morning Paper in Ruston until his death last year. He relished nothing more than feasting on the carcasses of bloated egos. He single-handedly exposed a major Ponzi scheme in North Louisiana, sending the operator to prison. That got him some major ink in the Atlanta Constitution and the New York Times.

The problem of course, is trying to narrow the field to make the final selection manageable.

The obvious choice for most would be Bobby Jindal, but there are so many other deserving candidates that we caution readers not to make hasty decisions. After all, we wouldn’t want to slight anyone who has worked so hard for the honor.

So, without further ado, here are the nominees, along with a brief synopsis of their accomplishments.

Bobby Jindal: Mismanaged the state budget for an unprecedented eight consecutive years. At least there’s something to be said for consistency. In his eight-year reign of error (mostly spent in states other than Louisiana) he managed to cut higher education more than any other state; he robbed public education to reward for-profit charter schools and virtual schools; he gave away the state’s Charity Hospital system (he awarded a contract to the new operators—a contract with 50 blank pages which is now the subject of what is expected to be a prolonged legal battle; he appointed political donors to prestigious boards and commissions, including the LSU Board of Supervisors which, under his direction, fired two distinguished doctors, the school’s president and its legal counsel; He trumped up bogus charges against the director of the State Office of Alcohol and Tobacco Control (ATC) to appease mega-donor Tom Benson and to appoint the husband of his children’s pediatrician to head up the agency; he forced state offices to pay higher rent in order to again accommodate Benson by signing a costly lease agreement with Benson Towers; rather than consider alternative ideas, he simply fired, or teagued, anyone who disagreed with him on any point; he refused Medicaid expansion, thus depriving anywhere from 250,000 to 400,000 low-income citizens needed medical care; he tried unsuccessfully to ram through pension reform that would have been devastating to state employees; he insisted on handing out contract after contract to attorney Jimmy Faircloth who is still searching for his first courtroom victory after receiving well more than $1 million in legal fees; he spurned a major federal grant that would have brought high-speed broadband internet to Louisiana’s rural parishes; he stole $4 million from the developmentally disadvantaged citizens so he could give it to the owner of a $75 million Indianapolis-type race track—a family member of another major donor and one of the richest families in the state; he abandoned his duties as governor to seek the Republican presidential nomination, a quest recognized by everyone but him as a fantasy; he ran up millions of dollars in costs of State Police security in such out-of-state locations as Iowa, New Hampshire, Ohio, and South Carolina; he had the State Police helicopter give rides to his children, and the list goes on.

Attorney General Buddy Caldwell: All he did was completely botch the entire CNSI contract mess which today languishes in state district court in Baton Rouge; He consistently turned a blind eye to corruption and violations of various state laws while ringing up what he thought was an impressive record of going after consumer fraud (Hey, Buddy, those credit care scam artists are still calling my phone multiple times a day!); and his concession speech on election night was one for the books—a total and unconditional embarrassment of monumental proportions.

Kristy Nichols: What can we say? This is the commissioner of administration who managed to delay complying to our legal public records request for three entire months but managed to comply to an identical request by a friendly legislator within 10 days; We sued her and won and she has chosen to spend more state money (your dollars, by the way) in appealing a meager $800 (plus court costs and legal fees) judgment in our favor; it was her office that came down hard on good and decent employees of the State Land Office who she thought were leaking information to LouisianaVoice (they weren’t); she first reduced premiums for state employee health coverage in order to free up money to help plug a state budget deficit all the while whittling away at a $500 million reserve fund to practically nothing which in turn produced draconian premium increases and coverage cuts for employees and retirees (and during legislative hearings on the fiasco, she ducked out to take her daughter to a boy-band concert in New Orleans where she was allowed to occupy the governor’s private Superdome suite.

Troy Hebert: appointed by Jindal to head up ATC which quickly turned in a mass exodus of qualified, dedicated agents; he used state funds to purchase a synthetic drug sniffing dog (hint: there is no such thing as a synthetic drug sniffing dog because synthetic ingredients constantly change; this was just another dog, albeit an expensive one); he launched a racist campaign to rid his agency of black agents; while still a legislator, he was a partner in a firm that negotiated contracts with the state for hurricane debris cleanup.

Mike Edmonson: Oh, where do we start? Well, of course there is that retirement pay increase bill amendment back in 2014; there is the complete breakdown of morale, particularly in Troop D; then, there was the promotion of Tommy Lewis to Troop F Commander three years after he sneaked an underage woman into a casino in Vicksburg (he was subsequently fined $600 by the Mississippi Gaming Commission but only after first identifying himself as the executive officer of Troop F and asking if something “could be worked out.”); allowing Deputy Undersecretary Jill Boudreaux to take advantage of a lucrative buyout incentive for early retirement (which, in her case, came to $46,000, plus another $13,000 of unused annual leave) only to retire for one day and return the next—at a promotion to Undersecretary. She was subsequently ordered to repay the $56,000 but thanks to friends in high places, the money has never been repaid (maybe incoming Commissioner of Administration Jay Dardenne would like to revisit that matter); consistent inconsistency in administering discipline to officers who stray—such as attempting unsuccessfully to fire one trooper for assaulting a suspect (even though the suspect never made such a claim) while doing practically nothing to another state trooper who twice had sex with a woman while on duty—once in the back seat of his patrol car.

David Vitter: what can we say? The odds-on favorite to walk into the governor’s office, he blew $10 million—and the election. His dalliance with prostitutes, his amateurish spying on a John Bel Edwards supporter, an auto accident with a campaign worker who also headed up the Super PAC that first savaged his Republican opponents in the primary, turning Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne and Public Service Commissioner Scott Angelle irreversibly against him and driving their supporters to Edwards’s camp. In short, he could write the manual on blowing an election.

The entire State Legislature: for passing that idiotic (and most likely illegal) budget on the last day of the session but only after Grover Norquist was consulted about the acceptability of a little tax deception; for allowing Jindal to run roughshod over them on such matters as education reform, hospital privatization, pension reform and financing recurring expenses with one-time money; for being generally spineless in all matters legislative and deferring to an absentee governor with a personal agenda.

Those are our nominees but only after some serious paring down the list.

Go to our comments section to cast your vote in 25 words or less. The deadline is Friday, Dec. 18.

I know too many people whose lives have been turned upside down by some of these people to describe them as mere boobs. (If Guillory, for instance, were on the list, I’d vote for him, as he is nothing but a boob.) Jindal is something far worse, but he gets my vote. Nichols and the Legislature tie for second place.

jindal, Kristy Kreme and Vitter are way too venal to be described as boobs. I pick those in the legislature who acted as part of jindals delusional campaign staff instead of fulfilling their responsibilities to the people who elected them.

Calling jindal a boob is an insult to boobs everywhere. Apologies, Tom, I know you were trying to be circumspect.

Though I am seldom at a loss for words, and can never limit myself to 25 of them when hundreds will do, I cannot think of just one to describe jindal. The list of nouns and adjectives would fill volumes.

Kristy Nichols followed her own nature but jindal gave her the platform from which to stage destruction. Hebert has a vicious streak a mile wide. For all his many faults, Edmonson is not intrinsically mean. Caldwell is rather boob-like, but Vitter is in a class by himself, far uglier than mere boobdom.

Of the entire legislature, two members do not deserve the boob moniker, one of them just elected governor. The rest are loudly bleating sheep – making lots of noise but following the leader du jour. Many have the same disdain for the less fortunate as jindal – hands-down winner of all the negative descriptors from anti-Christ and a—hole to zombie – paraphrasing a business publication: “zombie” is one who is officially alive despite being emotionally dead. A person that needs constant bailouts in order to operate… that appears healthy but in fact teeters on the edge of ruin. Zombies suck life out of an economy by consuming tax money and labor that would be better deployed in growing its people.

Jindal without a doubt. He has done so much to hurt our state that I fear we will not recover from his swath of destruction and bullying. He will be remembered as the governor who destroyed Louisiana. He continued to kick us while we were down.

Since we can only vote for one, the obvious choice is Jindal!!! During my lifetime, there has never been a more inept, crooked, absentee governor, serving under the guise of ” transparency'” and “family values”!!! As to his use of state police during his “run” for the presidency, he should be forced to reimburse the state for every dime before he leaves office!!! If not, he should be sued and the story carried by every news agency!!!

However, if we were allowed, I would say this entire slate deserves the prize!!!

As an educator I was looking for john white on this list! While the others are well deserving of inclusion, any chance you could have Mike Deshotels share a list and give john a chance for votes? He sure seems like a contender!

As I explained to another reader, because the list is subjective, there are necessarily deserving candidates who were left off the list. John White is certainly one of those–as is the entire Louisiana State Board of Dentistry, several individual legislators, the Secretaries of various state agencies, et al.

I can only apologize if a favorite boob was left off the list. The only solution is to open it up to write-in candidates…so feel free to make your own nomination. It’s all in good fun—except to those who get votes.

Jay Dardine gets my vote he is all for Jay and in this upcoming administration he’s got a place to shine till he retires rich for the rest of his life, the biggest fraudster that was ever appointed by a governor ever, I’ll bet he switches back to dens.now that he’s made his little nest. David

I vote for Kristy Nichols as Boob of the Year. Most of the other equally-deserving candidates mentioned have already been at least minimally outed to the public (though none have yet received just punishments for their crimes). However, Kristy seems to fly beneath the radar. Many citizens are unaware of how the quality of life for the rank and file Louisiana citizen has deteriorated under her policies as Jindal’s Commissioner of Administration for the past 5 years.
When I wrote a letter of protest to 15 different CEOs of Ochsner Health Systems in October to protest their hiring of Nichols at a handsome salary despite some clear conflicts of interest in their relationship with her, and more importantly, how much the policies she engineered and implemented have all but destroyed access to affordable health care in Louisiana. I received ONE reply back from my 15 letters from a David M. Gaines, CEO-System Retail Services/Marketing (whom I never even wrote to) stating that Ochsner had extensively vetted Ms. Nichols before hiring her, with special attention to ethical concerns, and that she would be answering directly to him. If anyone wants to check how she is doing, you can contact Mr. Gaines’ assistant, Brandee Barteet at 504-842-4311.

Because she has been able to walk away from the Jindal disaster relatively unscathed, I believe that Kristy Kreme Nichols most deserves to be recognized for this honor.

Kristy Kreme and her team of accomplices. And what a team it was! Robin Hood in reverse! Her 7th floor, southwest corner office in the Claiborne building should now be a shrine to corruption. What a legacy ALL the candidates have left.

I can’t fault Nichols for following orders. I can’t fault the elected officials, as they mirror the voters’ own faults. Sadly.

Edmonson is a complete toady, selling himself anyway possible to keep his job. Trying to sneak his retirement raise when all of the other (save one) state employees are suffering is completely unconscionable. Hanging is too good for him.

We won’t get better officials until we get better voters. Many thanks to Tom for helping make the state better.

Bobby Jindal. It took 3 year in congress and 6 years as governor before Louisiana figured out what a scam artist this guy is. The last two years as governor everyone had him figured out but 9 years to get there?!?! Sad it takes so long for people to overcome their prejudices.

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